Inglewood football gets back on track after bye week with win over Huntington Beach

From ocregister.com

INGLEWOOD — The Inglewood football team closed the regular season with some starters, including quarterback Lincoln Jahn, sitting out the final game in Week 9.

Then came a Week 10 bye ahead of Friday’s CIF-Southern Section Division 2 opener against Huntington Beach.

“I don’t like sitting out,” Jahn said. “Hate sitting out. I was eager to back on the field.”

Jahn jumped right back into the mix, helping Inglewood jump out to a big lead, before holding on for a 44-35 first-round win over Huntington Beach.

Inglewood (10-1) will visit Bay League rival Palos Verdes in Friday’s quarterfinals.

Jahn completed 13 of 19 passes for 255 yards and four touchdowns. Three of them came on Inglewood’s first three possessions (one apiece to Andre Williams, Amir Nickerson and Allen Wilson). The Sentinels also scored on their fourth possession, a 3-yard run from Semaj Welch for a 24-0 lead.

“We (the offense) flowed great in the first half,” Jahn said. “It helped us get up really, really early to where it put us in just a situation where I just have to manage the game and not go be a game-changer, like I would usually do.”

The game, which was trending toward a blowout, never really made it there thanks to Huntington Beach (10-1) quarterback Brady Edmunds. After a slow first half, the Ohio State commit, took advantage of some situations in the second half, outscoring Inglewood 26-14 in the second half.

However, despite decent numbers (26 of 45 for 379 yards and three touchdowns), it wasn’t an easy night for Edmunds. He was harassed all night by Inglewood’s pair of Division 1 defensive tackles Elija Harmon (Oklahoma) and Myels Smith (Texas A&M). He was sacked four times and forced into hurried throws several other times.

“We noticed they didn’t really play against a lot of good D-Lines during the season,” Harmon said. “So as we’re watching film, we notice like (Edmunds) he’s kind of just sitting back there and that’s where he’s dangerous. We couldn’t let him do that and that’s something we reiterated all throughout the week.”

In the second half, Inglewood built a 36-9 lead on a 16-yard touchdown from Marlon Watson. In the fourth, Edmunds connected with Dylin Bruce for a 35-yard touchdown, followed by a 3-yard score by the quarterback, cutting the deficit to 14 at 36-22.

Watson added a 24-yard touchdown run to give the Sentinels a 44-22 lead, but the Delta League champion Oilers responded with a 63-yard touchdown pass from Edmunds to Skylar Robinson and the final score came with 1:50 left with Edmunds connecting with Kye Crump for 14 yards, making it 44-35.

“Fatigue and rust is always a factor,” Inglewood coach Mil’von James said. “But we had some very efficient practices. We worked on a lot of things, a lot of mental things, not so much the physical aspect, and I think the physical aspect is the one thing I was kind of concerned about, but the first half they showed what they could do physically.

“Attrition is always an issue for us because we’re such a small team and that kind of reared its head in the end. We were trying to get some bodies off the field and we gave them some late points that I wasn’t too happy with. They have some offensive weapons and they do good things offensively, but I just didn’t think that they’ve seen the team speed, team physicality that we bring to the table.”

Robinson had nine catches for 178 yards and Bruce had six receptions for 94 yards.

Williams finished with six catches for 149 yards and two touchdowns for Inglewood and Watson rushed for 197 yards on 26 carries and two touchdowns.

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